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Sunday, 7 April 2013

Saturday Night Fever

Less than a week until My First Audition. I've got a fucking cough and a blocked nose. I sound like Dierdre from Coronation Street, if she were holding her nose and trying to talk through it... unfortunately that's not the character I'm going for.

I'm lying low this weekend, pandering to my throat and nasal passages: Come on my lovelies, you're all right aren't you? Let's just sit here quietly and drink tea and when you're ready to perform monologues again just let me know, ok? No pressure...

FOUR DAYS!

Really I should have had TWO quiet weekends before my audition- maybe that would have prevented this snuffly cold and cough- but last weekend Mairi was visiting and my cousin Chloë was here from Thursday to Friday.

They both arrived around the same time on Thursday night so me and Kayt took them to Coffee Parisien on rue Princesse- they do a lot of brunch-style dishes, as well as bagels, burgers and club sandwiches. Then, instead of going straight home, I took Clo on a late night stroll to the Grand Palais. We walked arm in arm until we could see across Pont Alexandre III, to the golden dome of Hotel des Invalides.

"I didn't think it would be this beautiful!" she said.

Say what you want about Paris, it knows how to Dazzle and Beguile. Unfortunately, it can also Disgust and Bewilder, as you can see in the picture below...

It worked out really well that Mairi and Clo were here at the same time- on Friday afternoon they went on a tourist chum together, while me and Kayt were working. We all managed to meet up for a sandwich at lunch from that amazing Greek traiteur near Blanche metro. We ate our lovely sandwiches on the steps of the Sacre Coeur and then we saw a man dressed as a chicken, pushing an empty shopping trolley through Montmartre... Oh leave him alone, he looks happy enough! (By the way that coat on the edge of the photo is me, wearing my infamous I Know What You Did Last Summer Coat. Not sure where my hands and legs have disappeared to...)

I was amazed that we were the only people who seemed
surprised/disturbed by Chicken Man, considering how
widely-accepted it is to openly stare at anything deemed 'unusual' in
this city... In fact, when we went out that evening, my cousin decided to wear my
multicoloured, feathered headdress (that I only wear in Ibiza or at festivals) and people on the metro couldn't stop staring at it. Maybe Parisians just want us to commit: either go full-blown chicken, or leave the feathers at home.On Friday night we ate dinner at G.Shore's apartment... it's amazing. If you've never lived in a chambre de bonne, you won't understand how exciting it is to find yourself in a proper apartment in Paris, with separate rooms and a real oven and a spare room which contains nothing but an old-fashioned writing desk, positioned next to the window. Luxury.We spent so much time there this weekend that me, B and Kayt started calling it 'our apartment', the only snag in the cardigan being that G.Shore returned to Paris on Tuesday and we had to vacate our lovely home for three. We should have looked into French squatting rights... I can't believe how big the apartment is- I think that after living in such a small room, I'd get tired walking from the bedroom to the shower every morning, then into the kitchen for some breakfast, then back to the bathroom to brush my teeth... yaaawn.

TEED was playing at Social Club on Friday night and Chloë really wanted to see him, but we left it too late to get tickets and I wasn't sure if everybody else was up for it, so we ended up going to Le Truskel. I was a bit worried I'd ruined her trip by not taking her to see TEED. It's stressful having visitors. My mind goes blank and I can't think of anywhere to go... also they expect to go out before 1am and I can't accommodate that: I need at least four hours between getting home from work at 9pm and going out; to drink tea, make plans, try on clothes, check Facebook... and panic.

On Friday I had a little bit a nervous breakdown. We'd had to rush home, get ready in five minutes in my crack den of a bedroom, then we had to rush out again...
"This is why people don't like going out in Paris. It's stressful!" I shouted, as we waited for the lift, which never came, because it was broken.

(Sometimes I'm a horrible host. Do you remember when my little brother visited and he spent most of his time reading in bed or playing on my laptop? It still haunts me.)

After dinner at G.Shore's apartment, Mairi and Kayt bailed on us (slags) but B and Shayna said they would meet us in Le Truskel. I've not been there since last year, mainly because it's always full of boys in skinny jeans and I don't know how to dance to indie music anymore, but I'm glad we went. It wasn't TEED, but it was fun.

We got home at 6am and had to leave mine at 7am, as Clo was flying to England in the morning. We set multiple alarms on three different phones to make sure we got up. Boy oh boy it was hard getting out of bed, but it wouldn't have been fair to get Clo really drunk and then expect her to find her way to the airport an hour later, so I decided to escort her all the way to Charles de Gaulle. I vaguely remember wandering up and down the terminal a few times, then I got back on the Roissy bus and slept all the way back to Paris.

The next night Kayt didn't come out again because she's got a horrible cough (people on the metro were crawling away from her as if she had the zombie virus) but me, Mairi and B went to Le Pigallion in South Pigalle.

I've wanted to try Le Pigallion for ages, as I've walked past it a few times on my way to Chez Moune and thought it looked like an interesting night... Let's just say I won't be trying it again.

TC and OJ were going with some friends from England and they said it was a night run by the same people as Coco Beach. (Me and Georgie went to Coco Beach the first year we moved to Paris and the music and was brilliant, it was like FUSE but outside.) We queued for about forty minutes. In the line scallies kept asking us if they could go in with us, because the bouncer wasn't letting groups of guys in. Three scallies in particular were really persistant and we heard them saying in French that they were going to tell the bouncer they were with us and we wouldn't understand because we were English. Nice try, dickheads, but there's no way you're getting in wearing that studded denim gilet, whether you pretend to be with us or not.

When we finally got in, I couldn't believe how rammed it was. The toilets were the rankest thing I've ever seen in my life and it had TWO doorways, so there were two lines of girls queuing from two different directions for three toilets. Also, people were walking through the toilets to get to the balcony, which was the 'smoking area'.

I loved the music and the dance floor wasn't too horrendous, but it was just chaotic. It was not the sort of place I should have taken Mairi. We managed to get in about an hour of dancing, then me and B said we'd walk Mairi back to Kayt's.

I won't bored you with a detailed account of yet another dangerous crush in a Parisian club, but the bouncers wouldn't let us leave the club. I know I bitch about all bouncers but these were truly the worst door staff I have ever seen in my life. They wouldn't let us out of the club because they wanted people to queue for the cloak room, but they we didn't have anything in the cloak room and they still wouldn't let us out. People were begging them to let us out but the bouncers just stared over their heads and pretended they couldn't hear them. It got worse and worse, to that horrible moment where you think it's actually all gone wrong and somebody's going to die, then an different bouncer sprang up from nowhere and told the two bastards keeping us all back to open the doors.

Another club I might have to potentially declare jihad on. I don't know, I think it would have been ok if I'd been really fucked, I might go again if somebody good is playing. TC and OJ stayed until the end (or not right til the end I think, because it finished at midday) and TC told me:
"At one point in the night, all the normals disappeared and all the odd bods came out of the walls, like a 90s horror film."

Ha! I can imagine the scene exactly.

The next day was Easter Sunday. Since last summer, when we had that gorgeous day of cooking and drinking at Georgie's followed by an easter egg hunt in the park, I've come to think of Easter as a really lovely day to spend with friends, roasting meat and getting drunk.

I'm so glad Kayt had the keys to G.Shore's apartment for the weekend! Louvre Laura and her friend Anya joined me, Kayt, B and Mairi and we had roast lamb, fairy cakes and ten bottles of sparkling wine. B said she'd never celebrated Easter before we got dressed up in maxi dresses for the occasion- it felt like a real holiday, like Christmas Day with better weather.

Ah it was so nice! Holly had a friend visiting and they wanted to go out, so we went and met them at- surprise surprise- Le Truskel. I can't believe we went there twice in one weekend but hey, it was open on Easter Sunday and it was free. Only this time it wasn't as fun, because the DJ's sound system kept breaking and a horrible man assaulted B outside the club. The bouncer wasn't arsed in the slightest and let the guy back into the club, so we left.

But it didn't ruin our lovely Easter!

On Easter Monday, after putting Mairi on the bus to the airport and promising her we'll visit her in Madrid (we really, really want to!), me and Kayt went back to 'our apartment' to tidy up the remnants of our Easter Sunday/spring equinox celebration. (Eating, drinking, things coming back to life- literally no difference, except druids aren't allowed to wear fabulous hats and silky robes.)

Then Holly and B came round to enjoy our last afternoon in 'our apartment' before G.Shore returned. We went to McDonald's and I got the new eighteen chicken nugget meal... then they told me they'd run out of every sauce and I panicked and didn't change my order. Serves me right for being so greedy, I suppose.

G.Shore has Apple TV so we lounged around watching documentaries through Kayt's iPhone. We watched this one documentary about vaginas and how women have operations to make them more attractive. It resulted in a very lively discussion about our vaginas which I was sure would end up in a mass vagina-exposing session... but it didn't. (I was ready to whack mine out an' all.)

And that's all folks! Went to Chez Gladines on Wednesday, other than that I've been eating lots of oranges and trying to make myself better. Can't believe my audition is in four days.

8 comments:

a great thing for clearing up a stuffy head, and I swear that it works like a miracle, is to buy an Actisoin plug-in from the pharmacy or para pharmacy and put it next to your bed while you are sleeping. The eucalyptus is wonderful or drying up your nose. It will be just the thing to use before the audition. good luck!!!